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Sunday, October 9, 2011

Today's posting is a super rare treat! The fossil shown here is a paratype of the blastoid Orbitremites kentuckiensis. This fossil is one of two left in the personal collection of Dr. James Conkin who named it. The holotypes are stored at the Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History (USNM PAL 127316): CLICK HERE TO SEE. Amazingly, the Smithsonian has imaged these specimens in their database. It is rare that I find specimens in their HUGE database that have been imaged. Maybe they like pyritized blastoids which appear to be very rare. The fossils might also consist of marcasite which if not properly stored can break down (pyrite disease) into melanterite and sulphuric acid.

Dr. Conkin tells the story of discovering the Coral Ridge Member (New Providence Formation or Knobstone Group) of Jefferson County, Kentucky, USA in 1957 and the pyrite fossil fauna there in his 2006 paleontological memoir "I SEE... WONDERFUL THINGS" on pages 101-103. He describes the area as "a frozen paradise of former life." The book contains a bittersweet story about what happened to the third paratype specimen as a squirrel mistook it for a nut.

This is a very interesting book filled with images of
fossils and stories of how they were found throughout his long career. The
locations range from China to throughout the United States (e.g.
Kentucky, Indiana, Tennessee, Texas).

Dr. Conkin also found another new species of this blastoid named Orbitremites coralridgensis. The holotype (USNM PAL 127324) can be seen at the Smithsonian collection web site: CLICK HERE. Note the genus may now be known as Globoblastus.

Copies of this unique book might still be obtained from Hycliffe Publishing, LLC

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About Me

I am an amateur paleontologist who studies marine invertebrate fossils in the Louisville, Kentucky, USA area. We have fossils from the Ordovician, Silurian, Devonian and Mississippian (Carboniferous) Periods of the Paleozoic era.
Contact: louisvillefossils@gmail.com